There used to be a radio commercial that advertised a language learning system. They said how they made it easier by teaching ‘tricks’ like saying socks by spelling it out means some phrase in Spanish. S-O-C-K-S.
I don’t know what that translates to because I don’t speak Spanish. I only speak English and specialize in profanity.
I am laying in bed after taking a rare weekend shower. I usually prefer to go ‘full goat girl’ on weekends. Anyway, I am laying here and I thought, you know, if I always had someone give me a goddamn topic, I’d never have trouble writing a post.
I find writing much easier when someone gives me an idea. Thinking up shit on my own is hard, yo.
Then, I had a full on argument with myself.
Me: Don’t be dumb. You have been writing a blog for 4 years now. It’s not like there is a limit on how many words you can write.
Me: Hey, remember when Joey was 4 and we told him that he was going to use up all his words if he didn’t stop talking and then he told us we were preposterous?
Me: Yeah, that was some funny shit. Stop changing the subject, jinglebrains.
Me: Fuck you. It is easier when someone tells me what to write about.
Me: Bullshit. You don’t need that. You could write about anything. Just fucking pick something. Write about socks.
Me: Fine. I’ll write a post about socks
Me: Don’t do that. That’s dumb.
Me: No, you picked socks. So that is what we will do.
I am not a fan of wearing socks. I have hot feet. I have hot feet in the Summer. I have hot feet in the Winter. Wearing socks is tortuous to me.
Just because I don’t like wearing socks, does not mean that I hate socks. I love socks. I love buying socks. I love looking at socks. I love socks that have nerdy pictures or sayings on them. I love sweat socks that have worn down to the little nubby things that happen just before they get holes in them.
Yet, we have an ineffective sock system at our house.
What we do, when socks get washed, we put the socks in one of two laundry baskets. Then we never match them up or put them away. Of course, that means we can never find matches, which necessitates buying more socks.
I am also in the middle of the Great Sock War. So far, it’s a long war. The Great Sock War has gone on longer than the Korean war.
Randy has some quirks, you guys.
For instance, we can only buy specific glasses to drink from. They have to be pint glasses. Mostly, the should be plain, but it’s okay if they have a beer logo on them. One he deems worthy.
He also has a thing about collecting socks. Randy has more socks than any human male needs. If we were locked in a tower with nothing but Randy’s socks, we could fashion a rope and escape. It’s absurd how many socks he has.
He is also maniacal about hoarding his socks. God help the teenage boy who pilfers his dad’s socks. So of course, the teenage boy pilfers his socks on a daily basis.
Randy: Are those my fucking socks again?
Joey: What socks?
Randy: The goddamn socks on your feet. You are wearing my socks again.
(Please note, Randy’s voice always gets this incredulous tone at this point. Like he can hardly believe the boy would dare touch his socks. Even though he does every day.)
Joey: I didn’t do laundry.
Randy: Okay, how about this? Touch my socks again and I’m taking the car away.
Me: Well, that escalated quickly.
Then the battle dies down and Joey continues to have nearly exclusive use of one of the two piece of shit cars we own and does so while wearing his dad’s socks.
Usually, around twice a year, I decide to match the socks up. I dump both baskets on the bed and sit behind the mount Vesuvius of socks and I get into the sock zone.
The sock zone is a weird and slightly disturbing place. The sock zone brings me a sense of comfort, but in a weird way, like picking a scab.
My brain continually batters me with recurring thoughts about my health or something dumb I said or did 25 years ago. My brain forces me to listen to music, which isn’t always bad, but sometimes it’s Kung Fu Fighting or MacArthur’s Park.
Then, I start sorting socks. I become a machine who will spend hours matching socks by their current stage of grayness and number of holes.
For anyone reading who happens to be husband, please skip the next few lines.
I throw out a shit ton of socks. Even if they have no holes in them. The tops are stretched out or they’re more than 5o shades of gray. Plus, I think the older socks are more likely to organize. They might attempt to force the younger socks into their army so they can take over. They have got to go. Yet, if Randy actually witnesses me throwing out a sock that has obviously shuffled it’s mortal coil, he acts like I just boiled his Christmas puppy or something.
Okay reader/husband, you can pick up here.
I don’t enjoy sorting socks, but the sorting activity seems to calm my brain for a while. There’s also the satisfaction of seeing those two empty laundry baskets.
That last sentence was a lie. They’re never empty. Not ever.
That is it.
(S-O-C-K-S)
What a great read to start my morning! We always have a basket or two of unmatched socks, too. For much of the the last few years, there has been 20 feet in this house! We can never find socks and it has become “cool” to wear mismatches – on purpose! By the way, I had to bring up MacArthur Park on YouTube…
Mismatched is the way I go. I don’t give a fuck if they match or not. I mean, if I wear them, which is rare. Macarthur Park is horrible.
I recently went through the husband’s underwear drawer and folded and organized the whole thing. I thought he would be appreciative but nope. He says he can’t find the particular pairs he likes now. The husband is VERY particular about his undies. It seems he’s always on a quest to find the perfect pair. I was even inspired to write a story about a quest to find the perfect pair of underwear. In light of all this, I don’t see me attempting to do anything with his effing sock drawer!
Hahhah…best that you don’t.
I love this post on socks. You know, my brothers always tried to steal my Dad’s socks. He wore only black to work. My father was a very disciplined man and he safetypinned the socks in pairs when he took them off, making them automatically matched when they came out of the laundry. I have socks with pictures on them so they are easy to match. My hub wears black or white to work. You are right. Of course you can write a post about socks. Everyone has something to say about socks.
Socks is one of the main ten conversations in my house.
i hate socks. Every fall I get out my basket of unmatched socks. Every spring I am ready for the sockologist. I don’t mind if the colors don’t match but I can’t stand it when one is high up on my leg and one is around my ankle. If I could get tattooed socks that would keep my feet warm – well, there you have it.
Tattoo socks…BRILLIANT!
My feet get cold in the winter so I love socks then. And fortunately I married a woman who, after approximately nineteen years of marriage, would become a knitter. She makes the most awesome socks. I would mention the TARDIS socks, but I think I’ve mentioned Doctor Who in comments twice this week already and I think that’s the limit.
I’ll just say that because the knitted socks have to be hand washed and hung to dry there’s never a problem with mismatches coming out of the dryer, and if they ever have to be thrown out she’ll knit more.
In the summer, though, I prefer to have my feet uncovered. My mother still talks about how when I was a kid and we had to go somewhere I would ask if I could go “barefoot in my shoes”. It was cute but I seriously think she reached the limit on telling that story a while ago. It’s one thing to tell it to strangers, but I don’t need to hear it every three months.
HAH! Moms are so proud. And I covet your Tardis socks. You could mention Doctor Who in every comment and I wouldn’t mind.
Mister has two full drawers of socks. So does our son. So what did he ask for for Father’s Day – socks. He covets them and touches them lovingly deciding which ones will ‘speak to him’ in the morning. It is all so disturbing.
See? This makes me feel normal. HAHAH.
I have a cat and a washer who both steal socks. I don’t match socks because I know it is just going to upset me when I get to the end and have half a dozen socks with no mates. I have enough on my plate to worry about without putting myself through that hell.
HAHAHA…No one needs that kind of stress.
The secret of every wife/ mother… tossing the socks. We have a lost sock basket in the laundry room for the ones left over after matching… it is always full.. where the hell are all the damn socks?? I sit down once every month or two and sort the ones that i can match up… and toss the rest. I figure if a match hasn’t made it to the basket there is no match.. gone.
Yeah..I am overdue to complete this task. It’s been months and months.
Ha! A great post about—-wait for it—-socks!! This was like something right out of the “The Middle”. Thanks for a fun read, Michelle.
Oh thank you!
When I was a young, broke hippie I’d often go around without shoes. Yuck, right? I would drive somewhere barefoot and then be rummaging through my Dodge Dart trunk trying to find shoes and socks. Finally a girlfriend showed me how to draw thong sandals on my feet with a Sharpie marker. No one ever noticed that my feet were drawn on with a massive “V” on top – it worked every time!
God…that is perfect. I would prefer to be barefoot all the time.
We have similar discussions about socks in this house. We have sock CHAOS here.
Also, I’ve been working on a post about socks. Because, socks.
OMG..I CANNOT WAIT to read it!!
Somewhere in the universe there is a wormhole totally clagged full of single socks….
Mostly black …
It’s probably saving us…the sock plug.
You are a blogging genius – you can write about anything and make it hilarious.
I, for one, love socks – I have dozens of hand knit socks and wear them winter and summer. They go into the wash matched and come out matched – I am anal that way.
I do throw out hubby’s socks all the time because he would wear them still when they are more holes than sock.
When he asks where all his socks are – I feign ignorance….
Hahah..thank you!
I figured that if I bought all the same style of socks that it would eliminate having to match them. But one batch I bought was taller than the other. I, too, cannot stand wearing socks of different lengths.
And socks somehow wear out at different phases. So I end up matching my socks on length and degree of wear.
You can’t escape the matching.
That should be a horror movie…You can’t escape the matching.
I hate folding/putting away laundry in general. Which is probably why I have one of those messy bedrooms with laundry baskets disguised as giant piles of clothes all over the place.
We have the same bedroom.
I too have that husband! We share socks but he pilfers the nice, new ones and stashes them. Weird thing about socks… I like to darn them. Go figure, in this day and age I darn. It’s very meditative, just like sitting on the bed and pairing them. What everyone else said, great post!
Anita
We all do our own thing to chill…once I glued pennies onto a bookcase to distract myself.
I used to walk more than ten miles a day (for a while) at a place I worked, and mostly walked to get around, and one time a good friend of mine bought me a brand-new package of socks and I was so happy I wept openly about it…
Hahah…a boy and his socks.
Wait..that sounded funny.
No lie, I just argued about socks with my husband yesterday. He complains now and again about finding socks mismatched. Who can fucking tell? They’re all white socks with grey bits on them. Now we have the added bonus of every other load of whites he decides the hanes are his not the boy’s (as if I am going to look closely enough to see if they are hanes or nikes or some other stupid brand). So my poor 15yo boy has no socks every other week or so. Ok, except his stack of swag black socks that he yanks up real high.
Actually my usual response is ‘fold your own fucking laundry then’!
Eso si que es.
Really….fold your own fucking laundry is the only reasonable thing to say it that situation.
jesus I love this.
You can seriously write about ANYTHING and it’s funny. Can I take a “how to be funny about anything” writing class with you?
I’m going to try writing about something laundry related. Let’s see how that goes
Yay!! You can do it! Just about anything is funny. Well…other than really unfunny stuff.
My daughter has a sock problem. She buys them constantly. You know how Target has that row of bins with $1 shit in it right by the door? There’s always socks (or those socklette things) in there. She cannot walk by without throwing a pair or two in the buggy. She doesn’t even look to see what they look like anymore. It’s crazy making.
Oh…and just sometimes I Lose. My. Shit. over the sock issue and she’s all, “God, Mom, it’s not like I’m on drugs or something.” Like those are my only two options…a plethora of socks or a drug addict.
HAHAHAHA….that sounds SO MUCH like the way Randy argues.
Hi M-
Who leaves a cake out in the rain?
Even more ridiculous is who the fuck writes about it?
Love,
Jill
EXACTLY!! Dumbest fucking song ever.
I used to try matching up my husband’s socks, but no matter how many widowed socks I took out of circulation, there’d just be another three odd ones out the next laundry cycle.
I decided sock physics is not for mortal minds to comprehend, and gave up.
HAHAHAH…Yes..best to not even try to figure it out.
Best post about socks I’ve read yet.
Who cares about matching? Just throw on the first two you see!
That’s what I do when I actually wear them.
You know what S-O-C-K-S means in Spanish? Absolutely freaking NOTHING. But “socks” in Spanish is calcetines. Which is a lovely sounding word. And “calcetines perdidos” sounds much nicer than “lost socks.”
It does sound MUCH nicer.
I solved the sock problem several years ago after my family decided they liked mine more than theirs. I went to Wally world and bought a shit ton of plain white socks. Miracle of miracles, nobody wanted plain white socks. When one gets a hole in it, out it goes. There’s always a match. Of course when someone washes them with a red shirt, they don’t match the others for a few washes.
I don’t think it would matter what we bought…my son will always wear my husband’s socks. It’s a thing now.
When Elka was a puppy, she would seize upon nearly anything laying on the floor. Rather than puppy proof, because that would require training all the humans, myself included, I trained the puppy. Whenever I saw her with an inappropriate item, I acted like she was the bestest and smartest Doberman puppy that ever did Dobe and I clapped and called her and gave her treats in exchange for the item. Socks were frequently that item. She’ll find socks on command now. And take them to a named person in the house.
Also, we pretty much buy only one style and color of sock in the house, so unless they’re my super long boot socks (for under my knee high lace up boots), they all match.
That’s just smart shopping, right there. I need a puppy that will fetch me things.
My daughter and son-in-law stayed with us for a week or so when he was in the Navy. She and I did his laundry and to our amazement, none of his multitudes of socks had a match. They were all white, but some had a thin blue stripe, some a grey stripe, some 2 or three stripes; it was a nightmare. He didn’t seem to care. A friend of mine buys socks about 100 pairs at a time on sale somewhere, all identical. Quite a time-saver. He offered to give me some but I turned him down. I like a little more variety.
Yeah…we are a family of non matching sock wearers. haha.
Okay, it was “goat girl” that sucked me in, “jinglebrains” that made me want to co-opt your made-up word, and your sock system that made me think that perhaps I’m not alone in the world. My socks are in a fucking cardboard box. It’s wedged between the back of the dryer and the wall. I only wear socks to work; I have to wear safety boots there. The rest of the time, it’s barefoot or no socks. When I need a pair for work, I fish through the box for an acceptable pair (acceptable=two black ones) and take them off as soon as I possibly can (which is usually at my front door), after work. It drives my husband insane.
HAHAHAH….SISTER!
I leave my shoes by the front door and it drives Randy nuts.
I hate to confess this, but I’m a compulsive sock matcher, and it drives me bonkers when there are ones that go unmatched. I hunt under every bed until I find the missing culprit, and after much searching, if it still has no mate, I toss it. Can’t stand the unmatched ones on top of the dryer. Of course, as soon as I toss, the other one turns up in someone’s backpack or pocket or something.
I can see that…I am compulsive about some things. Glad it’s not socks, though..I’d be doing NOTHING but chasing down socks with all my spare time
I would rather live a sock-less life as well. A few years ago when I bought a pair of UGGs, the old sales guy tried to sell me a pair of socks to go with them. I was like “No! These are UGGs, you don’t HAVE to wear socks! That’s the beauty of it!” He was all “But won’t your feet get cold?” and I was all “They’re lined, Dude! That’s the flipping point!” and he just shook his head at me, like I was some crazy, demented, uninformed sock-less rube. Who’s laughing NOW, sock man? HUH? WHO!? Er…hem…yeah.
I will wear my doc martens in the dead of winter without socks. because fuck socks.
So how many eggs did you succeed in laying on the bed?
I lost count.
Bahaha!! I remember the sock zone from when I had two little girls in the house. Once, I remember laying them ALL out on the counter in the laundry room in their mismatched glory, determined to find pairs–Like some crazy game of Old Maid. Didn’t work. There were actually 27 different single socks, ALL DIFFERENT patterns and colors, none of which matched with any others. No wonder my college sophomore now thinks nothing of wearing one green and one orange sock.
I totally sit on the floor with our orphan sock pile about once a week, and there are always those lurkers that get thrown back in the corner (out of sight, behind the vanity), to wait for their mate. I should tell them to give up already. If they’ve been there long enough to collect DUST, the mate has probably definitely jumped ship. As to WHERE they actually disappear to? just -wtf? It’s not like the family members are taking off their socks one at a time, in different rooms. Don’t they both come off at the same time, and go in the hamper at the same time, and then to the washer?
why
boggles the mind
ps–love your convo about finding a topic. Your posts usually inspire a topic for me, and then I can write like a whole POST here, as a reply. I’m such a hijacker, lol 😉
Sister…I am flattered..my ideas are at your disposal. 🙂
Thanks!
Every time I reply, I think “this reply is so damn long, it should be it’s own POST”.
Then I think it’d be all weird to always write a post directly piggybacked off another blogger. Like a stalker/blogger. Or fan-blogging. Yeah, fan-blogging sounds less creeper-ish.
Creeper-ish. I like that.
Also I just noticed I used “it’s” instead of “its” right there.
*embarrassed cringe*
My last huffington post article says bass ass instead of bare ass. I feel your pain.
also, I didn’t notice that at all.
Okay, I hate to be awkward here (or anywhere, actually), but you DO know what teenage boys do with socks, don’t you?
Hahaha…yes..I am aware. My son does his own laundry…
Ha I love this. I have a drawer full of single socks, not because the other went missing but because one got a hole in it and I have the bizarre idea that I might find a match for the others, which is as likely as me winning the lottery. Can someone please explain why one sock wears out faster than the other?
My sock sorting system is easy, I have a sock hanger over my bath to dry them and I never actually put the ones that are currently in rotation away, I just take down a pair every day until I’m running out and then it’s time to do the coloured wash again 🙂
Hahah…yeah..why DO just one sock get holes? Do we have retractable horns in one foot that we don’t know about.
I just have them in my head 🙂
Eso si que es! I remember that commercial. 🙂
My husband has innumerable black socks which he expects me to match by varying signs of wear. I throw a lot of socks away too…out of annoyance.
Yeah, annoyance plays it’s part in the process..
I have a sock basket on my dresser where all the mismatched socks go to live. I hesitate to throw any of them away – because what if their lonely mate is being held captive – in the back of my daughter or son’s dresser drawers or closet – and when they are finally released, they then find that I’ve shipped their one and only to the dump? I guess I should just become ruthless and take care of business – but I’m much too tender-hearted.
HAHAHAH.
Make sock puppets?
This brings back fond memories of me pilfering my mother’s socks when I was younger… until that horrid day when I rummaged around a little too goddamned hard for a specific sock and discovered “the” stash. To this day, I have post traumatic sock drawer syndrome, and opening a sock drawer can trigger memories of the day I learned that my parents didn’t just have sex, but they have kinky, toy-filled, interesting-position-jammed sex. Balls.
HAHAH…oh man..THAT is disturbing.
Yes. Yes, it is.